


The murderer in your bed

by traumschwinge



Series: Not all that glitters is blood [1]
Category: X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014) - Fandom, X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Serial Killers, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst with a Happy Ending, Dark, Established Relationship, M/M, Promise, read to the end there's no mcd in this, referenced murders
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-19
Updated: 2014-08-19
Packaged: 2018-02-13 21:08:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2165274
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/traumschwinge/pseuds/traumschwinge
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>20 years. 23 victims. Looking back, it's been a busy time. It's enough. The police is closing in now. Having been hunted for 12 years has made him tired. And handling his life as a husband with a job and his life on the side as a serial isn't getting easier either. Now, finally, the time to change the status quo has come.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The murderer in your bed

**Author's Note:**

> All I know about this subject matter is what I learned at school and from crime shows on TV. 
> 
> If you can't/refuse to read between the lines, this fic is not for you.

Erik waited with dinner for Charles. He waited for his husband either to return--which was not too likely, Erik knew, they were too close to solve that serial homicide case Charles had been working on all the time Erik had known him for Charles to come home just to have dinner with his husband. The  other option was for Charles to call him to tell him he wouldn't be able to make it, again, the third day in a row. That there might be a third option as well, Erik ignored for its very unlikelihood.

At ten, Erik ate alone in their spacious modern kitchen. By eleven he was done with dinner, had cleaned the kitchen and gotten ready for the night. He tried calling Charles but was redirected to voicemail every time. He pulled out his other, pre-paid phone, wondering briefly if he would have any better luck with it. He dismissed it as too risky just to find out whether or not Charles would be home tonight.

Over the years, Erik had gotten used to this. To sleeping alone in their spacious bed that always seemed too big. To waking up during in the small hours of the night when Charles crawled into bed after all, having given up on work for the night. To spending nights in a row on his own. To almost never knowing when Charles would be home.

But the good thing was Erik had learned to use those nights on his own for himself. If Charles wasn't home by ten, he rarely returned before two, most of the times closer to three in the morning. That meant three hours for himself, albeit on short notice. Erik had soon after their marriage learned to be flexible. One would be surprised what Erik could get up to in those three hours. Three hours weren't nearly as good as those nights when Charles would call and tell him he was sleeping in his office again, but it were three hours.

If Charles would have ever noticed, Erik would have told him he liked to use those evenings to work out and skip running the next morning. He'd never needed the excuse.

Erik went to bed at half past eleven. Tomorrow would be an important day for him, and Charles as well. It would all be so much easier if Erik was well rested where Charles wasn't.

Around three in the morning, Erik was woken by his cell announcing a new message. Sleepily, he checked it. It was from Charles, half apologetic, half triumphant. He was sorry he hadn't made it home the third night in a row. But they now had a name, the first useful lead in this case in five years. He missed Erik. Erik just thought that Max Eisenhardt could wait until morning and went back to sleep.

The alarm went off at six. Erik got up, went through his morning routine like every morning he would not go running on. However, he was unusually careful as he selected his clothes for the day. He had picked them days ago and then changed his mind so often he couldn't remember which he’d wanted to wear. He thought it had been slacks and a not too tightly fitting shirt, which he would wear over a t-shirt. He added another layer between shirt and t-shirt as if it was just an afterthought. It was a bit heavy, now, but necessary. He would be thankful for it later. And under the black shirt, nobody couldn't see it if he wasn't looking for it. Erik was rather pleased when he checked himself in the mirror.

He had breakfast. It was almost seven now. He had been idly playing with the pre-paid phone while eating. It was almost time now. He put his plate into the sink. It was almost sad to think nobody would clean it up in quite a while.

After breakfast, Erik went to the garage. He didn't get into his car, however. Instead, he knocked over one of the shelves. The neighbors should be able to say they had heard a fight. Then, he opened the door. It was still dark outside, just barely dawn. He had prepared a puppet of about his height and general physique. It was much easier to drag the puppet to his other car parked in front of their house than a real body.

When he had settled in the driver's seat of the other car--a black, American-made SUV he had bought after Charles had told him they assumed their killer to drive such a vehicle--he took out the pre-paid phone again. His own cell was on the concrete floor in the garage, hidden under a shelf full of trash. There was just one number programmed into the pre-paid phone. Erik looked around to see if any of their neighbors was approaching him. Of course, in a nice neighborhood like the one they lived in, nobody took enough notice of him to come over.

Erik pressed the call button and waited. It took Charles not even until the third ring to answer. So much for him being busy. Erik could almost have been jealous. "Detective Xavier," he drawled, modulating his voice carefully so it sounded not too much like himself anymore.

"Mister Eisenhardt," he heard Charles hiss at the other end of the line.

Erik laughed. "So you finally know my name, Detective, I'm impressed." That it took an intelligent man like you this long to follow my bread crumbs. I've been ready for weeks, Erik added in the privacy of his head. "But you know, I know something, too. In fact, I'm just about to leave."

"Leave where?" Charles sounded tired. Had he truly not slept all night?

Erik told him their address. "Such a nice house. Very nice front yard. Very nice garage. And such a nice husband, too."

"You bastard!" Charles snapped. He sounded fully awake now. Erik started his engine.

"Oh what is it that I have in my trunk?" he sing-songed. "You'll never know if you don't check for yourself." He made a small pause. "I believe, now that you know my name, it's easy to find out where I live. I'll wait for you, my dear Detective. I wait for you at home. Don't leave us hanging like the last time."

He didn't wait for Charles' reply before hanging up and then immediately turned the phone off again. He had wasted enough time, even though it was time well wasted. Charles was now angry, desperate, and more determined to catch Max Eisenhardt than ever.

Too bad Max didn't exist. He was just as real as the puppet in Erik's trunk.

Erik drove out of town. He had driven this particular route quite some time now. Almost every other night when Charles had been working late, Erik had driven out to the old, lonesome house he'd bought such a long time ago in the name of Max Eisenhardt. He'd paid in cash, taken care the seller who hadn't even seemed to care all that much had one or two fake characteristics to remember about him (not much, just an earring and an odd belt buckle he had "borrowed"). He paid the bills, kept everything he needed in check and everyone else off his property. Not that there was anything there in plain sight. Of course not. But he didn't want the police to examine it too closely. Questions could be asked, like "whose blood is that under the carpet?" and other silly things.

It had taken him weeks of careful planning and feeding Charles and his colleagues the tiniest breadcrumbs to come this far. Erik was tired of hiding,  he was tired of the hunt. He and Charles wanted basically the same thing. Closure. And today, Erik would give this case closure. Twenty years had been long enough. If Charles even knew about the first one? About the college student that had tried to lull Erik in with promises and the prospect of a weekend away from everything just so he could have his way with him? Did Charles know it hadn't been self-defense or had happened out of sheer terror? Did the dear detective know that that first one had died because there had been an opportunity? An opportunity Erik had grasped.

He had been living on the high of that first murder for years. He had known he hadn't been careful enough, that he did not yet know enough about anything to get away with it if he tried again. The first one, that had been luck, like alcohol from a bottle of juice.

But all the ones after that hadn't been.

Erik parked the car right in front of the house. There was no need to hide it. In fact, he wanted the police to know he was home. So parking in plain sight from the road it was. Never mind that it also blocked the view to the door and one of the windows.

Erik took the puppet from the trunk. Here, out of sight of anyone, he didn't bother pretending it had any weight. He carried the puppet up to the attic. He had kept the inside of the house, despite its exterior, clean, so he wouldn't leave any unnecessary footprints. He would take care not to leave any marks he didn't leave on purpose. There would be blood leading upstairs and it would be convincing, thank his expertise in how blood got where. With how much he knew about cleaning up after murder, he could probably become a crime scene cleaner in his next life.

The house was empty. Open on the ground floor, still spacious enough for two people to sneak around, thanks to the lack of furniture. Like the name Max Eisenhardt, like the puppet, this house was yet another empty shell.

The biggest room on the ground floor was the one Erik had the fondest memories of, every surface covered in plastic back when he hadn't known how to avoid making a mess. Later, he had learned to kill, with all its pleasure, without spilling much blood at all. The human body was fragile enough to be killed even if you took away the option to let it bleed to death. But as much fun as that was, nothing had ever compared to the really messy kills he'd made. But messy was a risk he wasn't willing to take anymore. At 37, he was too old to do messy anymore.

There were other rooms, smaller ones on both floors, but Erik had only so much as looked into them. They didn't serve him any purpose but to make up the rest of an empty house. The only other rooms he cared about were the attic... and the cellar.

The cellar of the building had been what had drawn Erik to the building. But soon he had learned that cobblestone was impossible to keep clean. It was too cold down there to have proper, comfortable fun. The air felt constantly wet, almost too wet and hard to breathe too. Erik wouldn't use the cellar again. Nor would he use the tunnels behind the oil tank.

He still went down into the cellar and took his time down there. Twenty minutes passed before he came back up.

Last thing he had to do was get up to the attic again. He had chosen the room for their last stand-off. The attic was his stronghold. Here, he had kept more than one unfortunate soul. He had invested some nights, almost too many considering how he could have used those nights for more fun things. But after the first time he had left someone in the total, soundproof darkness of the attic for a week, with only the rattle of the food elevator he had installed in what had once been the chimney to prove that the world still existed, Erik had known it was worth it.

Now, he sat up the puppet on a chair. For his personal use, Erik always took a halogen flashlight with him. He would put it away later. This room had no place for light. He tied the puppet to the chair, mostly to keep it upright but also for the added effect. He placed an old camping lantern on the floor before the chair. It painted the puppet in dim light and deep shadows that made it look almost alive.

Charles had yet to arrive and Erik was starting to worry. What if Charles wouldn't come straight to him but wait for backup? He would want to make the arrest himself, true, but he couldn't tell whether or not Charles would be so stupid as to try it alone.

Still, if there was backup, they would have a hard time getting through the door. Erik would close it right after Charles. All he would have to do was getting Charles to be the first coming through the door.

Erik took out the pre-paid phone. Time to call his sweet detective again so he would hurry up.

"Where is he, Eisenhardt!" Charles hissed after the first ring.

"Hello to you as well, my dear detective," Erik hummed. The background noise didn't sound like Charles was driving. Odd. "Haven't you figured out my address yet? I'm starting to get bored all by myself in the dark up here. Lucky for me, I have your sweet husband for company. Though it's so hard to talk to him, what with him being gagged and all that."

"Leave him alone!" Charles snapped. An engine came to life on his side of the line. "Just wait until I get there."

"And then what?" A well placed false chuckle. "Of course I could do as you say, detective, but I don't think your husband would like that much. How long, would you guess, until he goes insane in a dark, soundproof room? Do you want us to find out?"

"Don't you dare!"

"Then hurry up. Before I get too bored. Remember the last time I got bored and your partner was around? We don’t want the same thing to happen to your husband."

Erik hung up. Upon consideration, he texted Charles his address. He wanted the detective to come as quickly as possible, after all. That being done, there was nothing Erik could do but sit behind the open trap door and wait in the gloom provided by the lantern for Charles to come.

It took another twenty minutes before Erik heard noises downstairs. He hadn’t heard the car pull up, not that it puzzled him. When he’d soundproofed the room, he had soundproofed it well. It didn’t sound like Charles had come with company. Erik was very pleased. It was even more pleasing to hear the steps come straight up to the attic. Two minutes later he heard steps on the ladder. In seconds, first the back of Charles’ head blocked the lantern’s gloom and then his entire body.

“ERIK!” Charles gasped. So he really thought the puppet was Erik. In the blink of an eye, Charles was fully up the ladder. The lamp was knocked aside in Charles’ hurry. It rolled away with a soft clatter and went out.

Erik closed the door.

It sounded like Charles had dropped to his knees. “Erik?” he whispered. “What the…?” There was a rustling of fabric. Then, Charles cursed. “Eisenhardt?! Where is he!” Charles must have turned around, his voice was loud and clear and directed at Erik. There was a sound as if a snap-hook had been opened.

“Here,” Erik said very calmly, just as the flashlight in Charles’ hand lit up. Erik raised his arm to protect his eyes from the sudden bright light.

“Stop playing games with me, Eisenhardt,” Charles hissed. The light shook a little as Charles drew his gun. Erik clenched his teeth as he heard him release the safety catch immediately. This time, this time for the first and last time, it would count. There wouldn’t be a second chance. And the stakes were high.

“I called you because I’m tired of playing games with you, Charles. I don’t want to do this anymore,” Erik said.

“And that’s why you kidnapped my husband?!”

Erik sighed. “No. I figured, making you think so would get you here faster. And alone. And I was right, wasn’t I?”

“Where is he?”

“I already answered that one.” Erik took a slow step forward.

“Don’t move! One more step and I will shoot.” Charles’ breath was quick. He wasn’t calm at all. Of course not, not when he couldn’t be sure that the dangerous murderer he was facing wasn’t carrying a weapon. Not when he couldn’t know that said dangerous murderer would never harm him.

“Erik’s not here. That’s just a puppet, just a few rags you stuffed into his clothes. Where is he? ANSWER ME!”

“Charles, I-” Careless. Erik was always careless around Charles. That was why he wanted to stop with the games on his own terms. But he had never been as careless as today, as he made another step towards his husband, toward the detective who had been after him since his first case in homicide.

In the dark, with no sound from the outside, the shot was louder than any either of them had heard before.

In the first reaction after the shot, Erik’s arms went to the numb pain in his chest. He coughed. Charles cried out, he must have recognized Erik by now. It was now difficult for Erik to breathe.  He dropped to his knees. Any moment now, he would collapse if the pain wouldn’t go away.

The gun clattered off in the dark. The flashlight dropped to the floor beside Charles. He was now by Erik’s side, from one moment to the next, or at least so Erik thought. It was difficult to see Charles’ face, he was too close and too far away at the same time.

“Erik,” Charles whispered. He could have yelled for all Erik heard. The rush of blood in his ears was loud enough to drown out everything else. Charles’ hand was warm against his cheek. Erik instinctively leaned into the touch.

“I didn’t want this, I never wanted this to happen, Erik, stay with me, please, I’ll call help, you just stay here, with me, awake, don’t you dare to die on me, Erik, you can’t just die.” Charles was babbling. He pressed a hand on  the hole in Erik’s shirt as if that would suffice to stop the bleeding from a gunshot.

“It’s no use, Charles,” Erik managed to cough out.

“Shut up, I’m not giving you up.” Charles was sobbing now. Erik wished he could somehow find the strenght to console him. “I thought I lost you, I thought he killed you, I can’t loose you, not like this, not ever. Erik, I can’t live on knowing I killed you. Erik, please. See, I’ve my cell phone here somewhere, I’ll call you help, you’ll be fine, see?”

Charles fumbled for his phone. He stared at the display in desperation. He didn’t curse. He just fell silent for a moment. Erik put his hand over Charles’ that was still pressing his chest down. Charles shook his head. He threw the phone to the far off corner.

“Charles,” Erik coughed. His head had stopped spinning. It was easier to think again. What had he wanted to tell Charles? Right..

Erik lifted his arm to Charles’ neck and pulled him close. Their foreheads touched. Erik could feel drops of water hit his cheeks. “I love you, Charles,” he forced out. His chest hurt so bad, the entirety of his left side was pure agony. “Come with me, Charles.”

His husband didn’t reply. Silent sobs shook his whole body. Erik gently stroked his neck.

“It’s alright,” he soothed.

“It’s not!” Charles snapped. “How can you- How should I- This is not alright.”

Erik sighed. It came out more like a groan, as blinding pain exploded in his chest. “It will be in a few days,” he still got out. Every breath hurt.

“How is this ever supposed to be alright?” Charles appeared to cool down a bit. He didn’t shake as bad as he had anymore. He was still crying, but there were no heart wrenching sobs. If Erik had been in less pain, he would have feel bad.

“Can I have one last kiss?” Erik croaked. He had to get out the words he had to say, but he couldn’t be sure Charles would still love him when he was done. He needed this kiss to go on.

“Of course.” Charles wiped most of his tears away with a hand, before he bend down and kissed Erik, so gentle like on a lazy sunday morning in bed. If that would be the last time they kissed, Erik could die in peace with the memory of the kiss in his heart until his last moments.

“There’s something I have to tell you, Charles,” Erik said when they finally broke the kiss.

Charles shook his head. “I don’t want to hear it. Whatever it is. Let me blame it on Eisenhardt. But I don’t want to know.”

“Charles, there’s no Max Eisenhardt,” Erik said. Now that it was out, he noticed his breath coming easier again. “There’s just me.”

“I said I don’t want to hear it! None of it! I don’t care, Erik, I don’t wanna know about you and Max Eisenhardt!” If Charles had had both hands free, he would have covered his ears with them, Erik was sure.

“Detective, I want to make a deal,” Erik said, doing his best to make his voice sound like he always had on the telephone with Charles.

“No,” Charles gasped.

“No, no deal?” Erik grinned. “Or no, I don’t want this to be true?”

“Just no. I don’t want to know just because you’re dying.” Erik's grin faltered.

“I wanted this deal before you shot me. Will you hear me out? Please. And let me sit up. I think you might be breaking my ribs.” The pain in Erik’s chest had mostly subsided

but for the area where Charles pressed his hand onto it with what felt like his full weight.

“But…” It sounded like Charles was about to protest. But then, Charles withdrew the hand, inspected it closely and then looked at Erik, his mouth hanging open. “I shot you,” he said. “I know I shot you. You went even down. Where’s the blood?”

“Still in my veins, I hope,” Erik tried to joke, but it was lost on Charles at this point. “The shot just knocked all the air out of my lungs, or something like that. It felt like you hit me pretty hard in the chest.”

“How?” Charles didn’t wait for Erik’s response. He had already ripped Erik’s ruined shirt open before Erik had even opened his mouth. Charles’ roaming hands felt up the bullet-proof vest Erik was wearing over his t-shirt. Charles glared at Erik. “You planned this!” he hissed. “Is that it? Have you… Is everything just a part of your grand scheme? If you hate me so much, why didn’t you just kill me? Why do you have to destroy me first?”

The smile around Erik’s lips withered completely. “What? No, no, Charles, it’s not like that. Never. I’d never hurt you, Charles.” He tried to reach out for Charles, but Charles slapped his hand away.

“Don’t touch me!” Charles even jerked back. He was shaking, but he wouldn’t let Erik near him for consolation. “Did you just… was everything you ever did a lie? Did you… When we met, did you know I was working on your case? Did we meet because of that?”

Erik quickly shook his head. “When I learned you were a cop, I wanted to end it,” he admitted. “But I was already in love with you. I couldn’t bear the thought of letting you go just because you were a cop. But then, you started to tell me about the serial you were investigating and I…” He sighed. “I wanted to break up before you found out. I even wanted to tell you and let you just have me put away. But I’m weak.” He paused. He knew he had to get it all out now or he would never tell it. Charles deserved to know. He deserved to know and make his own decision based on it. If Erik was lucky, he might understand then. If not… Erik would never kill Charles, but he wouldn’t let the detective arrest him either. “I love you, Charles. And I know you’re brilliant, but you were in the dark for so long and I thought, maybe I could get away with it, if I just laid low and were careful. And you weren’t getting closer. So I postponed telling you again and again.”

“...and then you noticed how desperate I was getting, so you started to call.” Charles shook his head. “I really thought you were mocking me. But you weren’t. I know, Erik, you’d never. But I thought Eisenhardt would. Why, Erik?”

Erik shrugged. “I guess I hoped if you could see things my way, if you felt the same thrill taking lives, I could tell you. But you never did.”

“I never did,” Charles agreed. He ran a hand through his brown curls. A sigh. Shaking of his head. Then, finally, “What’s the deal you wanted to make with me?”

Erik cleared his throat. He had been contemplating this deal for a long time. However, he’d never thought he would get this far. In this moment, his mouth was dry. "It's basically this: Stay with me, Charles, and I promise, as long as you do, I will never kill again. If I do, you know where to find me. I won't resist." He got it all out in one go, afraid of any break that might give him a reason to stop and never continue. Now that it was out, he couldn’t look at Charles. He would disagree for sure. Erik knew it. Charles couldn’t agree to something as lunatic as this deal.

For a long time, Charles didn’t say anything. Erik was getting nervous. “Erik, I really want to believe you, to trust you in this, but… You lied to me! For years! I don’t expect you to tell me, but- I still can’t believe you’d lie to me like this. How should I trust you? And anyway, it’s not like you could just quit it like smoking cigarettes!”

“I quit smoking for you,” Erik reminded him meekly. This wasn’t going well.

“I never asked you to!”

“No, but you said you knew your killer was smoking and that you were hoping for cigarette butts on one of the crime scenes.”

Charles pulled a face. “How many times did I accidentally help you to get away with it?” he groaned. “You make it sound like it was my fault.”

Erik shrugged. “I got a car like the one you were looking for.”

“This isn’t funny, Erik.” Charles sighed.

“It wasn’t a joke. You were right that a big SUV is so much more convenient. And I couldn’t use the company car much longer anyway. How would I have explained stains?” Erik explained. He didn’t want Charles to think any of it was his fault.

“But I helped you!” Charles buried his face in his hands. “I helped you getting away with it all those years just because I couldn’t keep my mouth shut about work in front of you.”

“But the fact I knew you were working on my case, that you were the one investigating, led me into mistakes as well!” Erik looked up. He still had no idea how Charles would decide in the end. “Are you going to arrest me now?”

“Mistakes? I never had any leads! Save for that one time, five years ago when a kid could give us a rather sketchy description… OH!” Charles cursed. “That was the first. After we got married, right? In the four years before, you never…?”

“I told you I’d try to stop for you.” Erik gave a helpless shrug. “But for the last five years, it seemed like it just wasn’t worth the effort. I thought you were going mad with that unsolved case and then you..” A sigh. “You never were home, I craved the next kill so bad and it was getting worse and worse. So many nights all to myself, why not use them, I thought. But after four years, I was sloppy and careless.”

Charles nodded. It was a curt little nod, but he seemed complentative now, rather than disgusted and guilty-feeling. “One day soon, you will write me down all of it. Every single murder,” he murmured.

“Is that your part of the deal?” Erik couldn’t help but hope again.

Charles looked him dead in the eye. “Did you ever doubt I would? It’s not like I have much of a choice here.”

“I would let you arrest me, you know?” Erik held out his wrists as if to prove that.

Charles shook his head. “And then what? I helped you. Nobody will believe you if you tell them I didn’t. Heck, not even I believe I didn’t help. But don’t think you’re off the hook. There will be consequences. Just not now.” Charles brushed his hair back with both hands and ruffled it. Erik knew this behaviour. Charles was tired. If the light had been better, he would have noticed sooner. But why wouldn’t Charles be tired. It had been a long day after a week of long days.

“Let’s go home,” Erik suggested.

“And what about Eisenhardt? I told Moira I was going to follow him, I told her he had you…” Charles’ voice trailed off. “Please tell me you have a plan for that as well.”

“Let’s just leave.” Erik got back to his feet. “I’ll take care of Eisenhardt.” The less you know the better, was what Erik wanted to add, however he kept his mouth shut. He hadn’t been able to set up a remote trigger. Or at least not one that could be operated from a long distance off. Blasted cellars and their unreliable mobile reception. “Just let’s get going before Moira figures out where you went and we need to think of something to tell her.”

Erik walked over to the trap door and pulled it open. The house was still silent, but the sudden light blinded him for a moment. He heard Charles walk up behind him. The tiny hair on the back of his neck stood on edge. He felt Charles’ hand between his shoulderblades. Erik didn’t tense up. He breathed out and relaxed. It was not that high a drop, but he could get hurt bad enough from this height. All Charles had to do was push. Case closed.

Charles didn’t push. He stroked over Erik’s shoulder. “We’ll work this out,” Charles murmured. “I don’t know how but we will.” Erik leaned into the touch. It was comforting, really, to know Charles was still there with him. That he had at least enough trust in him to promise they would figure something out. He’d do everything to make to up to Charles. If that was even possible.

They left the house together. Charles pointedly didn’t look anywhere, as if Erik would leave proof of his crimes or even whole bodies lying around in plain sight. Erik didn’t comment on it. He was still mainly glad Charles had agreed to the deal.

Outside, Charles had parked his car next to Erik’s bulky old SUV. He went straight to it, However, Erik didn’t follow him right away.

“I need to put my car in the shed. Just wait for me, I’ll be back in a minute.” Erik jogged over to the shed and pulled the doors open. Charles used the time he had to examine the tires of his car. Erik drove the car into the shed, got out of it again, and closed the shed’s doors from the inside. He had to be quick. Charles would come look for him soon enough. He hurried through the door connecting the shed to the house and over to the door leading down to the cellar.

He didn’t go down the stairs, though. He didn’t need to. When he had been down, he had replaced the light bulb near the gas tanks. He had partially opened the vent on one of them after that. Now, he couldn’t smell the gas up here, but he was sure it was there. Erik swallowed. It was either now or never, he knew. And he had enough time to get out. Most likely. Probably. In the worst case he would get singed a bit or something.

He just had to hope.

Erik closed his eyes, thinking, well, here goes nothing, before he flicked the light switch. He didn’t wait around to see if it had worked. He started to run the second he felt the light switch flick on. There was a rushing of air behind him. It made him run faster. It were only a few more steps to the door. A loud noise behind him. He stumbled. A shock wave hit him from behind. Erik had reached the door now and pulled it open. In the cellar, more gas tanks went up. The whole building was shaking.

Erik stumbled out onto the lawn. He had no idea how he made it to Charles’ car or inside. His back felt warm. Charles was saying something but he couldn’t hear it. They were driving, or so Erik thought. It looked like the car was moving. It felt like the car was moving, too, but that couldn’t be right because he felt like the car was spinning around him.

Charles stopped the car in a safe distance from the house. Iit was burning now, with a dark column of smoke rising from it. Another explosion went off. The fire must have reached the shed now. Charles turned to Erik and again said something to him.

“What?” Erik asked.

“...kay?” Charles repeated.

“I...guess?” His body hurt, but that could be still from when Charles had shot him. He had trouble hearing but that was alright, only to be expected. Granted, the back of his head felt a little warm. That was all there was to it.

“You smell of burned hair,” Charles remarked. “Take that shirt off and turn around, let me look at you back.”

Erik didn’t bother to fight Charles on this. He was fine, really, but Charles looked so concerned. So he turned around. It hurt a little as he slid his shirt off his shoulders. Taking the bullet-proof vest off made Erik groan as numb pain spread throughout his body. He tried taking off the t-shirt, but it felt like some of it had been baked onto his skin. With a hiss of pain, Erik rested his forehead against the cold side window.

“Oh Erik…” Charles murmured. “There was no chance for you to pick something less dramatic to destroy the evidence, huh?” He picked up his radio. “I should call in and tell my colleagues. Otherwise they might wonder.” He pressed a kiss to the unsinged side of Erik’s head. Erik turned. He had thought Charles wouldn’t hug him for a while now, let alone kiss him. Obviously, Charles had thought so as well. “Don’t think too much of that.” Charles turned away.”I’m still mad.”

“I love you, Charles,” Erik replied.

“I know, me too, that’s what makes everything so hard.”


End file.
